Electrical design for food processing facilities

[birddogger]

I'm a consulting electrical engineer designing my first food processing facility, and I have only a limited number of resournces/old projects to refer to in my design.

I am familiar with the types of light fixtures required for these designs, and have already talked with several vendors regarding what should be spec'ed, but I have a few more general design questions if anyone can help me:

For the processing areas where hosedown will be occuring, I assume WP receptacles and light switches will be required here, or is there something even more specialized for this application? Or are general purpose receptacles generally avoided in these areas?

I didn't see anything in the Hubbell or Leviton catalogs specific to food & beverage applications, though both offer devices made for wet industrial locations.

On one of the old projects I have for reference, the previous EE ran cable tray everywhere in the processing areas. This does not make sense to me. If you are required to specify light fixtures with smooth surfaces to alleviate dust accumulation/dispersion, how can you justify running cable tray through there, with its large surface area and open construction? Plus, cables do "twitch" on inrush, so I would think that the potential for falling dust would be high.

I will not be placing any lighting/power panels in any processing areas, but as far as items like disconnects, control panel enclosures, etc. - I assume these need to be suitable for wet locations as well. Is NEMA 4X the standard for all devices/enclosures/equip. in these areas?

In general, anything else I should know about elec. design for food processing areas?

Thanks in advance.

 

[orch]

Hi,
With reference to the cable tray, the biggest problem is trapped areas. Whilst conduit or trunking allows surfaces to be cleaned, dirt and bacteria can grow inside, the open format of tray at least allows the areas to be hosed down.

I tend to use tray "on edge" so that the horizontal area is minimised, and a lot of our customers now prefer the use of open st/st basket, like a tray but essentially formed from weldmesh type material which presents no flat surfaces.

We specify most of our enclosures and fittings to IP65, I understand Nema 4x is actually slightly better and should be OK